Imagine buying a car and, as soon as you get it, covering it with a half-inch layer of soft plastic. It sounds ridiculous, but that’s what we do with most smartphones. These devices that promise to be drop, swim, and dustproof are considered so fragile that we slap cases and screen protectors on them almost as soon as we take them out of the box.
I thought about this because I was a “no case” iPhone guy for years and only started using them because I wanted to attach a Pop-Socket or some other kind of iPhone mount that would make it easier for me to shoot videos. I have never used a screen protector since then because I am quick to tell everyone that I don’t drop my phone.
I’m an outsider though. Most smart people buy cases from Apple, Samsung, Google, and a ton of other brands (I’m currently using a Speck case with a fantastic MagSafe mount/stand). The most recent study I could find claims that 79% of smartphone owners do this.
I find the screen protectors, which are essentially another layer of thin glass on top of the phone’s original, even more confusing. As far as I can tell, most of them are no stronger than the original glass. Raise your hand if you have a friend who uses a smartphone with a finely speckled screen protector glass.
Raise your hand if you have a friend who uses a smartphone with a fine-grained protective glass.
It’s not that these phones aren’t strong, or that their screens can’t take a beating. Most of them can handle being dropped face down on the pavement and come out of it without a scratch. But it’s still possible to find that sweet spot where, if you drop the phone, it cracks from one corner to the other.
Most smartphones use some form of Corning’s Gorilla Glass. This ultra-thin silica-based glass is surprisingly flexible and has admirable scratch resistance (I once had a Corning rep rub a key over a Gorilla Glass panel). For years, Apple never specified what brand of glass it used on its iPhones. Then in 2020, it teamed up with Corning to introduce Ceramic Shield, which essentially embeds ceramic crystals into what I assume is something like Gorilla Glass for added strength. The Samsung Galaxy S 24 Ultra and the Google Pixel 9 both use Gorilla Glass Victus 2, which is about the strongest glass you can get.
I’m not sure if it’s all strong enough.
I carry my iPhone 15 Pro Max everywhere, and despite having a case on it, there’s nothing covering the screen. I’ve never dropped it, and I always make sure to put it in my pocket screen-side out so I don’t risk scratching the eyelets of my jeans. Sure enough, there are fine but noticeable scratches running the length of the Super Retina XDR display. Where they came from, I have no idea.
The Google Pixel 9, which I’ve had for about a week now, now has a half-inch notch in the center of the display; it’s deep enough that I can feel it with my finger. I’ve never dropped it or rubbed the phone against another device (as someone who reviews phones, I often carry multiple devices but never put them in the same pocket). I haven’t carried it with house keys in my pocket. I can’t explain the damage.
I worry that no matter what these phone makers do, they haven’t figured out how to make these displays scratch-resistant or at least more resilient. It makes me wonder why, after all these years, smartphones still don’t seem any sturdier than they did 10 years ago.
Considering we’re paying between $799 and well over $1,100 for these phones, shouldn’t we expect them to fit nicely in your pocket, backpack or bag?
The Truth About a Scratch
A scratched or even cracked screen doesn’t affect the functionality, but it is frustrating. It would be nice if these phones still looked the same after a few weeks or even 12 months of use as when we first unboxed them.
Cases aren’t just about protection, though. They’re a personal expression of style, or at least that’s what we’ve been taught to believe. If you think about it, the make, model, size, and color of your smartphone can express some of those same things. We slap stickers on our laptops to personalize them, but we don’t typically put them in bulky, rigid cases. I appreciate all the case designs and character options available, but I wonder if there will ever be a world where we don’t need them.
Probably not. Smartphones are only getting thinner, lighter, and with bigger screens. Physics tells us that the ground, rocks, a spot in your back pocket can all defeat the next generation of handsets.